Monthly Archives: June 2011

Will he, won’t he? I’m sure every Arsenal fan is sick to death about the same old rigmarole every single year.

The major difference with Arsenal (and we always have to be different don’t we?) is that the player in question has behaved impeccably. Cesc Fabregas is a sensational footballer, one of the brightest talents in world football. Yet he has always said the right things, respected Arsenal and never – publicly at least – tried to force a move away from Arsenal.

And that leads to a very strange and unique situation – Arsenal fans actually want him to leave. With any other football club they would be desperate to keep on of their prize assets. But the Arsenal fans know that for the last 7 seasons, we have failed him.

Every time he has put on the Arsenal shirt he has given 110% and been consistently our best player, by a country mile. Yet season after season we haveÂ brought in players which are not up to standard. What other Top Four team would capitulate in such spectacular fashion after being 4-0 against Newcastle United? What other top team would concede a last minute goal in such a ridiculous manner like Arsenal did against Birmingham City in the Carling Cup Final?

This Arsenal team has proved to lacking in key areas year after year.

And yet, despite being one of the best midfielders in football today, his market value is severely reduced because every man and his dog knows that he will only go to Barcelona. Ideally we could get Europe’s top clubs to bid for his talents but that will never be the case here, unless Manchester City decide to make things interesting, which is hugely unlikely.

So the figure touted is around Â£35/Â£40 million.

The argument for selling Fabregas would be to rebuild the side but we’d need a figure close to Â£65/Â£70 million to do that. And when you consider Cristiano Ronaldo was Â£80 million and Kaka, who has failed spectacularly at Real was around Â£55 million then you see how ridiculous Â£35 million for Cesc really is.

So this summer it will be a case of Arsenal keeping an unhappy Cesc and scraping fourth place in the league again next season.

Sol Campbell and Jens Lehmann are just of the Invincibles that have returned to Arsenal over the last couple of seasons, so having Paddy back in the Arsenal squad isn’t something that would surprise me at all.

He wouldn’t cost anything and we know Arsenal would love that.

And there’s the same argument we had when Sol and Jens returned – they could be a positive influence in the dressing room.

Hopefully this could spark Arsenal into life in the transfer market. We all know what areas Arsenal need to strengthen so with any luck after Vieira rejoins we can line up Thierry Henry, Ashley Cole and Martin Keown.